Heartbeats
by sharmini
Summary: Mordred had only ever wanted to serve his


**_This came after an attempt at watching the final episode of Merlin. The first time was hard enough and the second time was no better either._**

**_This is my take on the final few seconds of Mordred's life._**

**_Reviews will make happy again._**

**_Merlin belongs to all of us._**

* * *

He could feel his magic tingling just beneath his skin, urging for release, to unleash its own mayhem in the battlefield. It was only through sheer will that he was able to keep it in check. A knight fights his battle with his swords...

He wanted to laugh when the thought flitted through his mind. A knight? Mordred? An unbelievably cruel and misleading joke, if there ever was one. Yes, for a moment, a brief yet wondrous moment in his life, he held the honour of being a knight of Camelot...nay, a Knight of the Round Table. The joke ended when Kara hung from her noose.

His magic, the terrible, terrible darkness that held the power to destroy was unleashed. A heartbeat of uncertainty, which grew with every step Kara took as she was led up to the gallows. Another step and he saw Camelot burning, Mordred alone unscathed as he watched his magic gleefully wreaked havoc, the only way his magic could.

Another heartbeat and his decision was made. Morgana. More to save himself than to be an ally of hers. And in the confines of her dark castle, after revealing Emrys, a moment of doubt...

_Was this what he wanted?_

_Or was this the doing of his magic?_

-x-

His magic was the dark side of his soul. It rarely healed, rarely saved anyone or anything. The Druids managed to tame his magic, but his education with them was short-lived. An attack on their encampments by the renegade band led by Alvarr and they scattered. As Mordred watched one of the bandits cut the throat of the woman, who in the short months he has known her became the mother he never knew, the darkness within him stirred again. It did not even require him to think, all he had to do was wield it and the magic did everything. Six bandits died before Alvarr realised that treasure of the Druids was not in gold but in the small, pale boy. Alvarr threw down his weapon and bowed before Mordred. This was less a show of respect and fear and more of a strategy to win Mordred over for his own misleading cause. Mordred sometimes allows himself to wonder what would have happened if he had not met Alvarr. His education could have continued, he would have understood his magic better.

Perhaps his magic would have been pure, would have been used for good.

Perhaps he could have been worthy of Emrys and not looked upon with suspicion and fear.

Perhaps, maybe, if…uncertainties that Mordred decided was best left unexplored. He ran away from the ambush by Arthur and Emrys, vowing revenge. He had been frightened, he was only a child. But in those dark days, he grew up too quickly. He had to. He supposed his life endured purely through self-preservation. Or his magic. Despite the lax attitude towards magic outside the borders of Camelot, sorcery was still regarded suspiciously amongst the common people, more so when it is yielded by this young boy who barely spoke a word. His magic calmed somewhat, perhaps another way of self-preservation. He was not alone for too long when he was taken in by a Saxon mercenary. Mordred wielded magic less and less, preferring to hone his skills using man made weapons. Perhaps it was his magic's doing again, but it made the boy grow into a formidable young man. It was not long before Mordred joined the fighting forces of the Saxons. He went where there was money. It took him further from Camelot and his childhood. His fighting skills and leadership quality earned him the respect of men hardened by battles and war. His magic remained calm. Mordred came to forget Emrys and Camelot was a lifetime ago.

-x-

He heard of Morgana Pendragon amassing an army to take on King Arthur of Camelot. She was fighting to restore magic to the kingdom and it was said that she was on the verge of winning as well. Mordred knew he belonged with Morgana, knew he had to fight the fight and decided to join her. It was as if Mordred had come a full circle. His magic flared within himself and he knew he would be going somewhere where his magic would be both revered and fear. Mordred liked the sound of it. He will fight alongside Morgana, who once had cared for him unconditionally and was willing to sacrifice everything for him.

-x-

It was not until he saw Arthur Pendragon that Mordred realised that Morgana was not the only one who had taken great risks for him. Arthur, a prince then, had risked his father's wrath and possibly his life, when he helped Mordred to escape his execution. Arthur did not have to, perhaps he did it for Morgana, but he saved Mordred's life and delivered him into the hands of the people who, in their short time with him, had been good to Mordred. Arthur had given Mordred the best he could have done and it was certainly the best thing that had ever happened to Mordred, regardless of how little a time he got with the Druids. There was inherent goodness and nobility in Arthur effortlessly inspires similar inclinations and feelings in others. Even his magic, that began to rage when he saw Emrys, calmed down enough for Mordred to intervene on Arthur's behalf.

Perhaps at that moment, it was not his magic that calmed down. Perhaps it was the core of who Mordred was, his soul, the man Mordred strives to be, wants to be. Morgana's fight, her revolution seemed distant at that moment. Mordred decided that it was with Arthur he wanted to be with, to fight battles with, to fight any battles for. Emrys was….inconsequential. All Mordred wanted was to let Arthur see that Mordred had grown up, and despite everything that has happened to him, a childhood that never was, battle scars and anger, Mordred was still capable of goodness. The sort of goodness that Arthur himself had shown Mordred.

It was a decision Mordred never came to regret for even one moment. He saved the King of Camelot, son of the man who gave the orders for him to be executed all those years ago; saved him for the sake of saving a man's life, nothing more and nothing less. And for the first time in his life, Mordred was accepted into something akin to a group, a brotherhood that was more than a family. For his one act of valour, Mordred was elevated into something that he could have never ever thought possible. He became a Knight of Camelot. And for his part, reconciled with Emrys. He wanted to be a friend to Emrys, perhaps even learn from the great sorcerer how to harness his magic, as how Emrys does it.

For a short while, it seemed possible. It had been possible. Mordred became beloved of Arthur. The Knights, his brothers in all but blood. Emrys was…

It did not matter. Mordred had everything he could ever want and beyond. What he did mattered. It was not a mindless struggle. There was prejudice against magic, but it was only a matter of time his King saw that that destruction wrought by magic was more the will of the wielder than magic itself.

And then, he met Kara again.

-x-

Suddenly he was once again the Saxon mercenary, a sword for hire, feared and shunned by everyone. Save for the girl with the soft, hazel eyes and laughter that had lit his soul. He had known her many moons before his fateful meeting Arthur. Their meeting was not for long, but it had meant something for Mordred. With her, he was just a boy, and she a girl. His magic did not frighten her, it intrigued her. Her father was a warlock hunted down and killed by Uther Pendragon, but those days, Camelot and Pendragons seemed so far away. There was a resistance movement and Mordred had joined it, if only to spend more time with Kara. If there was something that he wanted for himself, it was Kara.

When he found her again, it became possible. He could have her. Except that she was a Saxon fugitive and part of a movement bent on killing Arthur and bringing chaos to Camelot. When he rode out to see her again, his bags laden with medicine and food, he had truly hoped she would realise the futility of her mission and accept him for what he had become.

She could not.

Mordred was convinced she could. Someone just needs to give her a chance. As he had been.

But in the end, Kara did the only thing she thought was right. She tried to kill the King. And declared publicly she would do so again.

-x-

Something broke within Mordred the moment Kara went after Arthur with the dagger. Perhaps it was his heart, perhaps it was his soul, rent asunder. For he realised that what he wanted was no longer a choice. The choice had been yanked away from him. A cruel twist of Fate or something, someone else, it did not matter. Everything they had said about Pendragon and his son in any camp of a resistant movement against Camelot were true. They were just kings to those who bent to their will, to those who wielded less power than them. And Emrys, the traitor to his kind, fuelled the fire.

Kara hung from the noose. Darkness consumed Mordred, unleashing his magic. There would be no more hiding. Mordred wanted to be free, wanted to stop pretending. He was powerful and he wanted Arthur, Camelot and especially Emrys to know it. They took away something very precious from him, despite his pleas, and he will do the same to them.

-x-

Camlann was the dark, desolate place that he thought it would be. He only had one target in sight, one man he wanted to fell. His sword felt light in his hand, as he moved through men and bodies towards his ultimate goal. The frightened boy who spent all his life hiding had been chosen by the Fates to strike the blow that would bring the world to its knees.

He thought it would have been a prolonged battle Arthur. But in the end, it spanned but a few moment, mere heartbeats.

It was not until he plunged the sword into Arthur's side that Mordred's world collapsed. After Kara, he thought his entire world to be void of meaning. But the moment his sword sunk into Arthur's flesh, stabbing through the armour and chain with nothing more than the effort it would have taken him to cut through a slab of butter, he could have easily been saved, could have easily saved himself. His heart broke all over again, his soul shattered, this time beyond repair when Arthur locked his gaze on Mordred. The look in Arthur's eyes, disbelieving that his own Knight, his Mordred, would do what he had done, the disbelief that he has been betrayed by someone whom he trusted with his life, pushed Mordred into the brink of the precipice Mordred had been standing at.

He fell into a void of chaos and insanity.

For there could be no forgiveness for Mordred. Nothing that he can do to make this right. Mordred has done what he set out to do. He has brought the world to its knees.

_For what?_

He wished to undo it. Wished…wished…

Arthur's reaction was swift, but it felt as if an eternity passed before Excalibur pierced his already broken heart. His life lasted the time it took for his heart to beat one last time.

And it was enough. Arthur's sword through his heart was both Mordred's punishment and redemption. There is nothing anyone who could have done to Mordred, no amount of torture for however long, would have justified what Mordred had done. Only Arthur could have punished him. And when Arthur drove Excalibur further into Mordred, it was redemption at last. Because there could not have been peace for Mordred's soul had the deed not be done by Arthur.

Mordred manages a small laugh, knowing that he was but a small cog in the machination of something that he could not even begin to understand. Perhaps this is Fate is. But he knew, he has found his peace. And he had no doubt Arthur forgave him.

The last thing he saw was Arthur. And felt his King's hand gripping his arm, holding him as he fell.

-x-

And there was nothing.

-x-

Arthur rose from Avalon many, many times after Camlann, rising to protect his beloved Camelot, Albion and the kingdoms he united. Always waiting for him was the guardian of the world, Emrys. And rising with him were the Knights of the Round Table.

Mordred too, rose every time. For he is a Knight of the Round Table and would so remain for all eternity, serving the Once and Future King.

It was the only thing Mordred ever strived to be.

-END-


End file.
